I am sure most of us indulged into all the world cup matches of India so far. Latest one being on a sunday, turned out to be quite a occassion for us at PR ( Purple Rabbit, Duh!). So we ganged up and broke into one of our friend’s place having some refreshment and all set for the match. Let us not get into the jitters of Indian Cricket Team, or the bravado of the Irish. Too much has been talked about it already, and I am sure its a good topic to talk about for some other blog.

So, in spite of the eventual win of India, we were thrilled with a discovery that shook us to the core. Right from the first drinks break to the last one, we witnessed a unique phenomenon. There are usually 2 drinks breaks for each innings in a one day match, which means media spots of roughly around 7-8 minutes. Quite a deal if you ask me. The amount of money that goes into those spots is huge, considering the TRPs that literally any match of India gets, nevermind the one in World Cup. So imagine our surprise when transmission of Star Cricket ( on which we were watching the particular match) was stopped and in its place came in a local cable channel!

This is highly unusual, and I must say a dangerous practice. TRP ratings which many in ad-circuit think to be of dubious nature anyways, would be of no use if there are sections in distribution that indulge in such fraudulent practices. At this point I must admit that the cable operator in local area where I stay, must have got a huge level of attention because of this little ruse he pulled. However I am sure he must have bulldozed a dozen media laws in the process. With growth of more and more DTH services, many think that old school cable operators are going to go off the scene soon. Well, here I would like to point out the little fact that the whole effort of this cable operator was to promote his own DTH service !! Very ironic isn’t it?

The bottom line is that an unknown cable operator from one of the suburbs in Mumbai, has walked away with sweet media spots, leaving advertisers and agencies helpless. Well all this hype around the Cup that Counts, did not account for this little theft for sure.